Re: MtMan-List: The Scottish

[Lee Newbill <lnewbill@uidaho.edu>]

On Wed, 21 Oct 1998, David Tippets wrote:
> the West are facinating.  Let's probe a little deeper into the concept of
> Scottish mountain men.  The answer to MacRaith's original question can be a
> simple as some Scottish names, or more complex if you put those Scottsmen in
> the context of the political and corporate intrigue of their day.

Hallo Again

I have noticed in my readings, when I'm reading American accounts, the
nationality of the subject appears to be either "white man"  or typified
by race, whereas reading Canadian or British journals, they are very
careful to call folks by their orignal nationality.... Scott, Irish, etc,
and when they refer to Indians, almost invariably they refer to the
tribe... Kutenai, Piegan, what have you.  Even the 3rd or 4th
generation Frenchmen of Montreal were refered to as French, and not simply
Canadian.
 
I'm wondering if this is not due to the fact that by that time (1810 or
so), the U.S. was a proud young Nation, and the Canadas was still a
colony?
 
I still have a lot of reading to do, so maybe this is an abberation.

As for Astor, I always felt kinda bad about his losing Astoria for pennies
on the dollar during the war of 1812... then I found out he did the same
thing to his Nor-wester partners later when the American Congress outlawed
foriegn owned business a couple of years later (and they were both
partners in the Southwest(?) Company). He also warned the
Canadians about the impending war of 1812 so his business partners
(British) could seize the border fur depots and save his furs...

Not uncommon bedfellows, war and profit.

Regards
 
Lee Newbill
Viola, Idaho
email at lnewbill@uidaho.edu
Keeper of the "Buckskins & Blackpowder!" Webpage
http://www.geocities.com/Yosemite/Gorge/7186